Craig Thomler's professional blog - eGovernment and Gov 2.0 thoughts and speculations from an Australian perspective

Craig Thomler

I've worked in the online sector since 1995 in roles including founder, publisher, journalist, webmaster, marketer, channel manager, CIO, COO and visionary. I left the public sector in early 2012 to lead Delib Australia as Managing Director Australia and New Zealand. More...

GoalEncourage a government Department to upgrade from Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) to an industry supported web browser.

BackgroundThe IE6 web browser was originally released by Microsoft in 2001.

Over the last eight years it has been updated twice, Internet Explorer 7 was released in October 2006 and Internet Explorer 8 in March 2009 (with developer previews available since March 2008).

Since 2001 the entire web browser market has changed. Netscape ceased developing Navigator (in December 2007) and new browsers entered the market including Apple's Safari in November 2003 (version 4 released June 2009), Mozilla Firefox in November 2004 (version 3.5 released June 2009) and Google Chrome in December 2008.

These entrants, and the long-standing Opera web browser, have significantly driven innovation in the market.

IE6 supportThe IE6 browser, being two versions behind, is no longer supported by Microsoft and is in rapid decline in community usage.

Major websites and organisations are progressively ceasing support for IE6, meaning that increasing numbers of websites are not accessible using the browser. For example, Google, the top accessed website in Australian and across the world, has advised that it will no longer be supporting IE6 for its applications.

Microsoft recommends end users that are browsing the web with Internet Explorer 6 to upgrade today to benefit from numerous improvements including security features and usability enhancements.

Interoperability is key to enabling developers to continue to create great user experiences on the web. Our commitment to the technical community continues with our significant investment in Internet Explorer 8.

We continue to believe in the importance of supporting the end users and encourage the technical community to work with us in securing a good transition for the users that today are using IE6.

Web standardsIE6 does not adhere to web standards as defined by the WSG and as reflected within the Acid2 test.

Acid2 tests aspects of HTML markup, CSS 2.1 styling, PNG images, and data URIs. The Acid2 test page will be displayed correctly in any application that follows the World Wide Web Consortium and Internet Engineering Task Force specifications for these technologies. These specifications are known as web standards because they describe how technologies used on the web are expected to function.

This test will eventually be supplanted by the Acid3 test, which is currently only passed by Safari 4, Opera 10 beta and Chrome 3.0.17.

It is not yet necessary for organisations to use Acid3 compliant web browsers as not all the test conditions within Acid3 have been passed by the W3C at this time.

Browser market sharesIE6 is currently in rapid decline, with the primary users being organisations who have not yet upgraded to more modern web browsers. Home users have predominantly upgraded to more modern web browsers.

It is estimated that Internet Explorer has between 52 and 74% web browser market share in July 2009 depending on the specific measurement site (source: Usage share of web browsers). Firefox has between 18 and 31%, Safari 2.6 - 4.1%, Chrome up to 3.1% and Opera up to 3.3%.

Internet Explorer 6 is estimated at having 15 - 25% market share globally. However in Australia this share is reportedly much lower, at around 9% (StatCounter)

Benefits of an upgrade

Moves the organisation to a supported web browser,

greater compatibility with web standards,

future-proofs the organisation's web browsing for several years (as major sites cease IE6 support),

aligns staff with citizens' use of the internet - statistics for Australian web use show that the Australian public predominantly use modern browsers,

Lastly, if time permits, I suggest installing IE 8 before the end of the week (August 8th, 2009) by downloading it from http://www.browserforthebetter.com because 8 meals are donated to Feeding America for every complete download and installation of IE 8 from http://www.browserforthebetter.com through August 8th, 2009.

Terrific post - now is there a business case for EDRMS and SharePoint?? eg: HP TRIM 7 and SharePoint 2010 and continual gov finanical management of EDRM system?????? But wait that would mean gov actually understood the value of information assets - it will never happen

Legal DisclaimerThis is a personal blog. It is not officially endorsed by the Australian Government. The views expressed are those of the author or originators and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Australian Government or any other individuals or organisations.